A severed head, I am. Congesting the fridge. My mouth smothers a jar of jujubes—she didn’t cut it off. My skin marbled, my smudged eyelids purple. Father carried this in his tepidity, but now I’m frozen and forgotten like mother. My nonexistent friends will not miss me. In front of my tongue sits uneasily an... Continue Reading →
Early Morning Love Song by D.R. James
Despite the moon, nearly full, gliding six inches above the western horizon where that faint line of a Great Lake lies, my couple of cardinals amidst the etched gray of sunrise say it’s morning, and all the little birds believe them. Despite me, nearing fifty, holding two inches before hitting the midway in a life... Continue Reading →
Affiliations by Sanjeev Sethi
How it ends affirms its essence. You went as lightly as you came or otherwise? Aleatory carriages are better suited to those not connected. This way they don’t wound. Closeness breeds craftiness. Photo by Dids on Pexels.com About the Poet: Sanjeev Sethi is published in over thirty countries. His poems have found a home in more... Continue Reading →
Crack in the Ice by John Grey
She pours the tea. The darkness pours itself through the kitchen window, surrounds the cup and the cigarette that droops from her lips. Somewhere out there is an icy lake. Somewhere out there is a crack sucking everything down – her son, even the light. Snow piles up against the door. Icicles point down from... Continue Reading →
If You Are Looking For Something to Read Out There by Laura Sminchak
I keep a list of my thoughts a rope thrown something to clutch when I remember and plunge remember and melt if you are up to anything it is a sight beyond dog-eared notebooks you would not tolerate an underwhelming afterlife reading scribbled musings remember when I bought the volumizing shampoo by mistake three trees... Continue Reading →
Strange by Askold Skalsky
Is it so strange after two years, still no peace with your leaving? The horizon never moves, lying quietly in its bed of distant scars and slants. I look above the tension wires over the sky darkening at four o'clock. The wire leads somewhere, brings something into a house where the cabinets are stocked with... Continue Reading →
The Stars are Naked by John Tustin
The stars are naked And when they cast their eyes down upon me, Tossed like a million dice, I shiver in my clothes and blankets – Wishing I could be concealed. Photo by Andre Moura on Pexels.com About the Poet: John Tustin is currently suffering in exile on the island of Elba but hopes to... Continue Reading →
Change in the World by John Grey
The storm’s fireworks will be nothing by midnight. So quiet, you’ll hear the worms in the soil, the ants in the rafters. For an hour or so, the world will be in the sky, flashing and pounding, pissing down like a locker-room of giants. But later, when clouds drift away, the night becomes transparent all... Continue Reading →
Dearly My Sighs Are Hanging by Palash Mahmud
Here at the periphery of chaos my longing surrenders into the slant shadows [ earnestly] There in the middle of hatr'd my voice stops on a numb'd note [ weightlessly] In a graceless reign where my way I am losin' [ effortlessly] by a shackl'd ray. In a dried desert where my sighs are hangin'... Continue Reading →
Every Surface Green by DS Maolalai
like water which seeps from a badly blocked faucet, nature pushes in through the city where it can. these old unused carparks, the yellow eyes of dandelions, striped grass raising shadow; a pavement tiger line, rippled by some minor city breeze. birds constructing bowers on brick-built cliff- side buildings. cats stalk, tails rising, flying flags... Continue Reading →